ASDP Faces Two Challenges Of Crossing Transportation In The Christmas And New Year Period

President Director of PT ASDP Indonesia Ferry (Persero) Heru Widodo. (Photo: Mery Handayani/VOI)

JAKARTA - President Director of PT ASDP Indonesia Ferry (Persero) Heru Widodo revealed that on the crossing of the Christmas and New Year (Nataru) periods this time there were two challenges faced.

Actually, there are two challenges for us (on Nataru transportation). The first is a surge in passengers and the second is extreme weather," Heru said at a press conference at the Ministry of SOEs office, Jakarta, Thursday, December 19.

Based on a survey conducted by the Ministry of Transportation, there will be as many as 110.67 million community movements during the 2024 Christmas Holiday and 2025 New Year periods, of which 53.8 percent will carry out movements using private vehicles.

Referring to this data, continued Heru, ASDP projects that the number of passengers using crossing transportation will reach 3,070,317 passengers on 13 national routes.

Meanwhile, the number of vehicles is estimated at 769,258 vehicles.

In detail, there are 223,562 two-wheeled vehicles and 341,637 four-wheeled vehicles.

Then for bus vehicles it reached 30,078 and trucks reached 173,946.

Heru said that to anticipate the number of vehicle spikes, ASDP together with Korlantas Polri would implement a delay system in the rest area going to Merak Port.

Furthermore, Heru said, the delaying system is useful for unraveling the number of vehicles in the port. So there is no congestion at Merak Port.

"Delaying this system is to anticipate so that people who use vehicles do not go directly to the port. So we delay first, when the port starts to get well conditioned, we will open the delay later," he said.

The second challenge, said Heru, is the extreme weather that occurred during the Christmas 2024 and New Year 2025 periods. Referring to data from the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG), extreme weather occurred from December to January 2025.

To overcome this, continued Heru, ASDP will continue to coordinate with related routes. Both from the BMKG and the Harbormaster Office and the Port Authority (KSOP).

"Well, this needs good coordination, don't go into extreme weather later, KSOP will issue a schedule for this ship later, we must follow it. Therefore, good cooperation between cross-sectors will determine services at Christmas and New Year," he said.